Kew
Gardens Hills
Compiled by Tina
Morales
History
Tucked into Flushing's southwest corner, on the
east side of Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, is the compact
community of Kew Gardens Hills. When the Dutch sailed into
Flushing Bay in 1628, they saw swamps, marshes and meadows. They
called it Salt MarshValley. Seventeen years later, they returned
to settle, and the community became the Town of Flushing. Since
Flushing Meadow was an impassable swamp at the time, it created a
natural boundary. For travelers to Flushing, it meant wagoning
along Queens Boulevard until they reached Vleigh Road, a road
that ran along the eastern perimeter of the swamp. Visitors
followed the road into the heart of the village. The road still
exists, and is now called Vleigh Place.
Kew Gardens Hills has had several name changes.
It has been known as Head of Vleigh, East Forest Hills or Queens
Valley. During the 1700s, the area was owned by William Furman,
who called his farm Willow Glen because of its lovely weeping
willows. He sold the property to Timothy Jackson in 1820. Jackson
expanded the farm to keep and breed fine trotting horses. The
Burtis Farm was next to Jacksons' and contained a spring noted
for its crystal-clear drinking water. This portion was sold to
Edgar Wakeman, who made his living bottling and selling the
water.
Queens Valley was still farmland in the late
1800s, but transportation enhancements attracted speculators who
purchased land and started to develop the nearby communities of
Hopedale (Kew Gardens), Whitepot (Forest Hills) and Richmond
Hill.
Since developers were hoping to draw New York's
prosperous and affluent residents to the area, several golf clubs
soon opened in the region. The Queens Valley Golf Club opened in
1922, and was followed by the establishment of Arrowbrook and
Pomonk Golf Clubs. The former was used as a summer residence for
former Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia.
With
the success of the neighboring developments and the opening of
the IND subway service in 1936, it wasn't long before the Head of
Vleigh section became attractive to developers.
Abraham Wolosoff purchased land and began to
design his own community of small homes and apartments. His
brochure extolled the community's good points -- its construction
on high ground, its lovely view of the park and its rural setting
-- he named it Kew Gardens Hills. Legend has it that Wolosoff so
enjoyed the hospitality of a hotel in Kew Gardens that he decided
to incorporate the community's name into his new development.
Twenty minutes traveling time to Manhattan,
coupled with the completion of the Grand Central Parkway,
attracted hundreds of new residents to "the hills," and
by the time the World's Fair opened in 1939, more than 1,200
homes were built withplans for hundreds more. In 1950, the
Flushing Post Office, responding to the population surge, opened
to handle the mail.
Today, Kew Gardens Hills is a tightly packed
neighborhood of garden apartments, co-ops, both new and
conversions, and private homes. In the 1960s, orthodox Jews from
Brooklyn and the Bronx, attracted to the wide variety of kosher
food stores and restaurants, moved to Kew Gardens Hills.
The community contains and continues to attract
a large Israeli population. Their presence is noticeable by the
variety of Israeli-owned businesses along Main Street.
Kew Gardens Hills has retained its
attractiveness, but it does have some problems. Residents
complain of an increase in crime, a shortage of parking, traffic
congestion along Main Street, airplane noise and the increase in
co-op conversions.
The Concerned Citizens of Kew Gardens Hills and
the Queens Valley Homeowners Civic Association
are two civic groups working to have these problems recognized
and satisfactorily solved.
Noted Residents Former and present Kew Gardens
Hills residents include State Sen. Jeremy S. Weinstein; Jacob
Koussevitsky, internationally known cantor, and Paul Stanley,
lead singer for the rock group Kiss.
Landmarks
Rabbi I. Usher Kirshblum Traffic Triangle, 73rd
Avenue and Main Street, was named to honor a former rabbi of the
Jewish Center of Kew Gardens Hills who was also a local civic
leader. Kirshblum, a native of Poland, settled in Borough Park,
Brooklyn, in 1923, and studied at the Jewish Institute of
Religion. He was first assigned to the Flushing Jewish Center,
but came to Kew Gardens Hills in 1946 and helped build the
center's congregation and a new building. He died in 1983; the
triangle was dedicated in 1986.
Queens of Peace Church, 77th Road and Main
Street, began in 1939. Second-generation Germans, Irish, and
Italians from Brooklyn and the Bronx came here to take advantage
of the "rural" settings. The congregation grew, and two
years later, a new church was built and dedicated at its present
site.
Reprinted with permission,Copyright
© Newsday, Inc.,1997
www.newsday.com
© 2008 Kew Gardens Hills Civic Association